"I'm assuming that you guys have purchased from each of these sites that you recommend?"

i have at all the ones i named except subterranean cinema, which i just found the other day. i'm assuming it's just a small-time bootlegging outfit, but the guy has some really hard to find stuff.

be sure that if you order something from sites like vdb.org or canyoncinema.com to let them know your purchasing it for personal use only. whereas a rental for a public screening may cost $100 or more, a VHS for personal use (to keep, not a rental) may be only $20-30. I know most of vdb's jem cohen collection is available for sale at $30 each.

dean, i've come across 5MO a couple of times during websearches and have been kind of skeptical. how have the quality of the films you've ordered been? no compatibility issues at all? what titles have you ordered?

as far as i can tell with subterranean, the website acts as a catalog, and you have to contact the guy who runs it via e-mail to order stuff. i'm tempted to get the kenneth anger stuff, but i'm waiting on fantoma.com to release their collection--although every time i try to contact them for a release data, my e-mail is returned back.

From 5MO I received God's Angry Man and The Humiliated. GAM was an "A" according to them and TH a "B".

I'd say that if you think of these ratings in the context of bootlegs (which these dvds are, obv.) then they are correct. Obv. they are not being viewed in the context of professionally produced videos and the ratings shouldn't be taken as such.

Also, from viewing these two dvds, the cover pictures are taken directly from their copies of the films and are indicative of the quality of the product. Now if only they costed less ...

You shouldn't since these guys don't. You also shouldn't feel bad ripping and re-burning the movie that you buy from them since they don't own them. Maybe I should start selling 'TV Carnage' on eBay...

Really? I assumed that American art-house theatres (we have an Angelika and two Landmark theatres) would show the two-hour cut to increase profits, etc. - I couldn't figure out any other reason for it to exist. Unless it's actually going to get a semi-wide release too?

I have a feeling it will start in Angelika (they already have the posters up) and then go wider. Nicole Kidman is so A-List right now, once word gets out about her performance (which is her best, by far) it might get picked up by some of the bigger chains.

For anyone that is interested, I contacted Subterranean Cinema. They do (or should I say "he does"--it's just one guy) sell copies of all of the films listed on the site. I didn't get prices for anything in particular, but he did tell me he does bulk rates for multiple orders & it sounds like it's cheaper if you don't mind multiple films on a tape (i.e. shorts/experimental).

My interested has been peaked in "the beaver trilogy". who has seen it? what's it all about? fill me in please.

Jay, I first heard about The Beaver Trilogy on This American Life (here's the episode in RealAudio -- it starts about 6 minutes in).

The way the TAL piece is structured (suspensefully) really piqued my curiosity, but if you just want the facts, here ya go:

In 1979, director Trent Harris shot some footage of some weird kid whom he randomly discovered in Beaver, Utah. The kid is in love with Harris's camera, hams it up with various celebrity impressions, and the 20-minute film (the first part of the trilogy) culminates in the kid doing an Olivia Newton-John impersonation at a local talent show.

In brief, the second and third parts of the trilogy are the exact same footage reenacted, first by Sean Penn (in 1981) and then by Crispin Glover (in 1985). (Actually, I don't think it's entirely exact -- there are some interesting discrepancies in each part of the trilogy.) Each of these films was sitting around in Harris's closet until the late 90s, when, for whatever reason, he was inspired to finally release them as one film.